STOCKHOLM / ROME, Mar 19 2020 (IPS) – The human factor is intimately involved in the origin, spread, and mitigation of the Coronavirus and we cannot afford to ignore that our future existence depends on compassion and cooperation. Response matters!

Some quarantined Italians might recall Giovanni Boccaccio´s The Decameron from 1353 in which people escaping the plague are secluded in a villa where they tell stories to each other. Boccaccio introduced his collection of short stories with an eyewitness account of horrifying human suffering in Florence, which in 1348 was struck by a ”pestilence” that every day ”grew in strength” while it swept relentlessly on fr…

JOHANNESBURG, May 15 2020 (IPS) – One of the planet’s – and Africa’s – deepest prejudices is being demolished by the way countries handle COVID-19. 

For as long as any of us remember, everyone “knew” that “First World” countries – in effect, Western Europe and North America – were much better at providing their citizens with a good life than the poor…

Andrés Cañizález is a Venezuelan journalist and Ph.D. in Political Science

A teenage girl covers her face with her hands in front of a laptop computer, frightened by the news she reads about the pandemic. Photo: Dusko Miljanic/Unicef

CARACAS, Aug 6 2020 (IPS) – Every era brings its own buzzwords or catchphrases along with it. The term du jour is ‘pandemic’, namely ‘coronavirus’ and ‘COVID-19’; but alongside these words, speculation and forecasts over the post-pandemic world are flourishing. There is a proliferation of pieces and commentary on what our daily lives or the economy will be like once the epidemic is under control, that i…

BOGOTA, Colombia, Sep 30 2020 (IPS) – This week, Heads of State and Government from 64 countries announced one of the strongest pledges yet to reverse the loss of biodiversity and nature’s contributions to people by 2030. Advancing from powerful pledges to concrete policy and action, however, means that nature must be moved to the heart of global, national and local decision-making. It’s time for nature to be reintegrated into everything we do.

Ana María Hernández Salgar

The is an explicit declaration of a planetary emergency, driven by human actions that are degrading nature and our climate at rates and levels unprecedented in human history.

As…

MEXICO CITY, Nov 18 2020 (IPS) – As many have observed worldwide, the outcome of the US presidential elections has been, as expected full of hope and fear. Many people had the bad feeling that if Trump were to be re-elected, the uncertainty, already enormous due to the pandemic and its effects, would jeopardize the economic recovery worldwide. The triumph of Democrat Biden does not guarantee great solutions, but at the least offers a little more of transparency, certainty, and stability.

Saul Escobar Toledo

For Mexico, the result could impact in different senses: the policy towards Latin America; pressures to stop undocumented migration; and the economic and commercial ties bet…

Remote teaching in Bangladesh. Credit: BRAC

DHAKA, Bangladesh, Feb 19 2021 (IPS) – School closings and the varied impacts of remote learning amid the COVID-19 pandemic are a global challenge. Educators worldwide have been struggling to meet contemporary educational standards in this environment. But this challenge is followed by yet another: how to assess the readiness of students to resume in-school education when schools open. At BRAC, the international nongovernmental organization that operates 25,000 schools in Bangladesh, serving 750,000 students, we have developed an approach that could be helpful.

Schools in Bangladesh have been closed since March 2020, …

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EKITI, Nigeria, Mar 19 2021 (IPS) – The mouth is a barometer of social inequities it reflects the injustices in our society. As , an 18th century naturalist said: Show me your teeth, and I will tell you who you are . To me, as a dentist, the mouth is like a microscope that reveals more than just tooth decay. It exposes us to a world where people lack access to water, health, quality education and live…

Yohei Sasakawa, Chairman of The Nippon Foundation, has served as WHO Goodwill Ambassador for Leprosy Elimination since 2001. He is part of Sasakawa Leprosy (Hansen’s Disease) Initiative, which has organized the “Don’t forget leprosy” campaign.

Jan 28 2022 – Sasakawa Leprosy (Hansen’s Disease) Initiative is collaborating with 32 organizations from 13 countries to promote the message “Don’t forget leprosy” in the run-up to World Leprosy Day on January 30. The international campaign includes awareness-raising events and outreach to governments and is being publicized via newspapers, television, radio, and social media.

Based in Tokyo, Japan, Sasakawa…

To fight economic inequality, female dependency on relationships and gender-based violence, female education is critical. Credit: Zofeen Ebrahim/IPS

Nov 30 2021 (IPS) – Despite the advances that have been made against HIV, the world has 37 million people living with HIV. And 680,000 people died from AIDS-related causes in . While the prevention of mother to child transmission, and provision of treatment as prevention, are , there are still . Over 1.5 m…